


Fake It 'Till You Make It

by CaptainSophieStark



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-25
Updated: 2020-09-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:20:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26646646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainSophieStark/pseuds/CaptainSophieStark
Summary: The reader is Tony Stark's sister, and the usual mission partner of Clint Barton. She and Clint have a flirty relationship, and on missions they're usually all over each other. Of course, it's all in the name of making Natasha Romanoff jealous. No other reason besides that, at least for Clint. Finally, the reader gets tired of it. She has real feelings for Clint, and she can't take the one-sided faking anymore. So she doesn't.
Relationships: Clint Barton/Reader, Tony Stark & Reader
Kudos: 26





	Fake It 'Till You Make It

What a gorgeous mansion, I thought to myself as the car rolled to a stop. It wasn't quite as scenic as my brother's Malibu house, but it was still pretty stunning.

My car door opened and Clint Barton extended a hand to help me out. I gladly took it.

"You ready?" he asked, putting my hand in the crook of his arm before starting towards the beautiful house.

"Always am."

Clint and I were one of several S.H.I.E.L.D. teams here tonight, tasked with finding and arresting a Hydra operative in attendance. Whoever he was, he chose this beautiful masquerade ball for the location of his secret meeting with a scientist we had recently turned to our side.

I'd have to thank him once we had him in custody. There were certainly worse places to spend the night than dancing in a gorgeous red dress with a handsome partner to flirt with all night. Clint looked amazing in his suit, which was absolutely no surprise.

He always looked amazing.

We walked up the steps arm and arm, and as we entered the house I started scanning for anything that might be of interest. While I didn't find any Hydra operatives, I did find something almost as interesting: Natasha Romanoff.

"Here, Clint, lemme fix your tie." I stopped Clint and stepped close to him, slowly moving my hand up and down his tie to get it just right. Then I leaned in until my lips were right next to his ear and whispered, "Natasha's watching."

I pulled back to see an understanding grin on Clint's face. He slung one arm around my waist, letting it rest way lower than necessary, and we walked confidently into the ballroom together.

See, this had all started a long time ago. Clint had been flirting with me, and I thought it was because he really liked me until I saw Natasha staring at us from the other side of the room. I quickly caught up, realizing Clint was flirting with me to get to her. We'd kept it going ever since.

I couldn't say I minded; the handsome assassin was definitely my type. I just wished it was something real, instead of a way to mess with Natasha's head.

Clint and I swept through the ballroom, the two of us the picture of elegance. We danced the night away, keeping our eyes out for anyone that looked suspicious as we twirled through the ballroom. After a few hours of this with no results, Clint apparently decided he needed a breather. He pulled me away with him, off the dance floor and to a part of the room that was partially concealed from everyone else.

I leaned back against the wall and Clint rested one arm right next to my head, essentially pinning me there unless I wanted to push my way past him. He leaned in close, until I could feel his hot breath on my neck.

"I needed a little space from everyone else," he breathed, moving his free hand to my waist. "I hope you don't mind."

"Of course not." I ran my fingers through his hair and over his broad shoulders, sneaking peeks back to the main ballroom to see if Natasha was watching. My heart sank when I caught her by the drinks table, watching us out of the corner of her eye.

So this was still about her.

"You know, I've been wanting to do this for a while," started Clint, pulling away just enough to look me in the eye. His lips were almost touching mine, and I felt my heart speed up, as much as I willed it not to. He leaned in, and as badly as I wanted to kiss him, I just couldn't do it. Not for her.

I turned my head and Clint stopped abruptly, pulling back slightly.

"Y/N, what's wrong?"

"I can't do this anymore Clint." I said, keeping my voice level and ice cold. No way was I going to break down in front of him, not over this.

"What—I mean, I don't—"

"I think I need some air."

I pushed past him without a word, not looking back as I left the ballroom and the mansion all together. I was in the middle of a mission, but I didn't care. I couldn't do this with him anymore.

Knowing it was only fake for one of us just hurt too much.

****************

Unfortunately for me, I couldn't avoid Clint entirely. Not two days later, we were partnered up on another mission, this time just the two of us. We were sneaking into an enemy base to get intel, so at least this mission wouldn't involve touching. I did my best to minimize my interactions with Clint, only talking to him when absolutely necessary.

"Alright, the drive should be over here..." I muttered to myself, looking at our intel and heading to the computer it indicated as the target. Before I could pull out the hard drive, Clint beat me to it, grabbing it before me and standing in my way so I couldn't walk past him.

"Y/N, what is going on? If the kiss was too much, then I'm sorry. I never should have—"

"Clint, it wasn't the kiss. And I don't want to talk about it, okay? So drop it."

"No, not okay. I wanna know what's going on with you and how exactly I can fix it."

"You can't," I said bluntly, snatching the drive out of his hands and shoving my was past him.

"Seriously, Y/N? That was so childish!"

"Go to hell Clint. I'm not doing this. Not here, not ever."

"You're just gonna change your entire demeanor towards me without so much as a word of explanation?"

"Yup, I am. So deal with it." I turned back to the tablet with our intel, ready to move on to the next room, but Clint had other ideas. He ripped the tablet out of my hand, staring me down with a fire in his eyes.

"We are going talk about this whether you like it or not."

"Really? Because last time I checked, conversations are two-sided. So rant and ramble to yourself all you want, see if I care. Now give me that tablet back."

"No. Not until you give me something to go on here."

"Barton, I am not kidding."

"And neither am I!"

"Why are you so damn stubborn? Just give it to me!" I tried to grab the tablet back from him, but he held it up so it was out of my reach. "Barton I swear to God, I am going to kick your ass!"

"Try me sweetheart! I've sparred with you, you don't have a chance in hell unless you want to gut me with your katanas!"

"Don't tempt me!"

Before he could come up with a scathing retort, we were cutoff by gunshots raining down on our heads.

"Fuck! We have to get out of here!" I yelled.

"We're just gonna have to make do with the intel we got!" Clint agreed.

Hill was going to be pissed.

****************

"What do you mean you only got half the intel?" Clint and I were currently standing in a S.H.I.E.L.D. debriefing room, being read the Riot Act by none other than Deputy Director Maria Hill. She did not look happy.

"We started taking heavy fire before we could finish the job," explained Clint. He'd barely looked at me since our argument, and I told myself I was fine with that.

"And what about your support team? They said you two got into a pretty heated argument that, to quote their expert assessments, 'certainly slowed down your mission and was likely the reason for your discovery'."

Neither one of us had anything to say about that. We just stared at the floor. But of course, Maria Hill wasn't going to let us off that easy.

"We might have had a bit of an altercation," I finally said. Somebody had to speak up, or none of us were ever getting out of here.

"A bit of an altercation?" Maria asked incredulously. Clint and I just nodded. "Fine. Then you're both on a bit of a suspension. You won't be partners, and you won't be doing any high-level assignments for at least the next month. Dismissed."

Clint and I turned without a word and walked out of the room. He stopped as soon as we cleared the door, but I didn't. Jaw and fists clenched, I just kept walking. Far, far away from Clint and the shame of that last mission. Away from Hill, and her sentence. A month without any interesting, meaningful assignments.

This sucked.

***************

I got home that night in an understandably bad mood. I was planning on just grabbing a snack and going straight to bed, but unfortunately my brother was still up. And of course, for some unknown reason designed to make my day worse, he was standing in the kitchen when I walked in, instead of down in his lab.

"Hey sis, why the long face?" he asked, looking up from the cutting board where he was making some kind of food close to midnight. I should have known I couldn't count on Tony Stark's regular sleep schedule for any reason.

"It's been a shitty day, and I just want to go to bed." I started to walk past him, but my brother dropped what he was doing and jumped in front of me.

"Hey! Come on, why don't you sit down for a nice home-cooked meal like Jarvis used to make and tell me all about it."

I sighed. As great as that sounded, I was still not in the mood to talk about my problems. Especially since it was with my brother, and about my feelings were about Clint.

"Thanks Tone, but I'm good. I just wanna go to bed and get some sleep."

"Are you sure?" he asked, looking a little worried. I nodded, and thankfully, he didn't push any further. "Alright, well, there'll be leftovers in the fridge if you want them tomorrow."

"Great. Thanks." He gave me a nod and a quick squeeze on my shoulder, then I continued on my way upstairs. I tried not to let myself think about any of it as I brushed my teeth and changed into my comfiest pajamas.

I had just sat down on the edge of my bed when I heard a knock at my door.

"Oh you've got to be kidding me," I groaned. "Come in!"

"Hey Stark." None other than Sam Wilson walked into my room, his voice soft and understanding as he came to sit down beside me. I could tell he was here to try and make me feel better.

"What's up Wilson?"

"Nothing much. Just wanted to come and check up on you. I heard you had a pretty rough day." Sam and I were good friends, so I guess my brother sent him in when I decided I didn't want anything to eat before bed.

"Yeah, well—" I was cut off by the awful sound of my phone ringing. I held up a finger to Sam, then reached over to grab it off the nightstand. It was Clint.

I ignored his call.

"Sorry about that," I said. "Anyway, where were we?"

"Uh, you were gonna tell me about—"

My phone rang again, cutting us off. It was Clint, again. I hit 'ignore' before my phone got all the way though the second ring noise.

"Okay, you wanna tell me what that's all about?" asked Sam, dropping the soft, careful tone in his voice. At least that was progress.

"No, I don't." I decided, looking up to meet his eyes. "It's an issue, but I'm handling it."

"Y/N..."

"Sam, seriously. I'm fine, okay? I've got it covered. And if that changes, I promise I'll talk to you. But right now I just want to go to bed."

Sam sighed. I could tell he didn't entirely believe me, but he gave me a pat on the shoulder and left anyway, thankfully. After ignoring yet another call from Clint, I put my phone on silent and then went straight to bed.

****************

Three weeks later and I still hadn't talked to Clint. Even worse, I was still running stupid missions. My job was to stakeout a college and just wait around to see if this suspect we thought might be a Professor ever showed. A week in, and he hadn't.

I had noticed a new face on campus lately though. I didn't know who he was, but he kept showing up. And, since I truly had nothing else to do at the moment, I decided it was time to get some answers.

It was later in the day, when most of the students didn't have class. The mystery man was walking down a mostly deserted corridor, and I followed a safe distance away. Time to see where he was going and what exactly he was up to.

I turned a corner, but suddenly my mystery man was nowhere to be seen. I crept down the hallway slowly, ready to unsheathe my katanas at a moment's notice. I'd just cleared the first doorway when somebody wrapped their arms around my waist and dragged me into the room. He shut and locked the door behind me, and surprise surprise, it was the guy I'd been tailing. I didn't waste a second before throwing my first punch. Might as well use the little element of surprise that I had.

"Woah woah woah! Y/N, it's me!" The guy ducked my punch, then held up his hands in surrender. I recognized that voice, dammit. I hadn't heard it in three weeks, but I still recognized it.

Clint removed his disguise, and I almost threw another punch at him anyway. I would've left too, but he was blocking my path to the door.

"What do you want, Clint?" I huffed, crossing my arms and trying not to let him see how much it hurt to see him again. To be this close to him again.

"I want to talk." He sounded urgent, like not talking was killing him almost as much as it was killing me. I knew for sure that wasn't possible.

"We have nothing to talk about."

"Y/N, how can that possibly be true? We were best friends, and now suddenly you hate me? What the hell?"

The look Clint gave me told me there was no way I was getting out of this conversation. Hell, maybe it'd be good for me to get this out in the open. Some kind of closure, or whatever.

Either way, I was finally gonna come clean.

"Fine Clint. You wanna know what's wrong? Fine." I took a deep breath. No going back now. "I couldn't take our 'fake' flirting anymore. Do you know how much it hurt to flirt with you almost every day, and mean every word of it, only to know you were just doing it to make Natasha jealous? To know that none of it meant anything to you?"

Clint didn't say anything for a while. He just stared at the ground, and I couldn't read his expression. Finally, he looked back up at me.

"Yeah, actually, I can."

Okay, not the answer I was expecting.

"What? What you mean, you can? I—"

"I mean, I can understand exactly how it feels to do a bunch of flirting and think it means nothing to the other person." That didn't clear anything up, so I just kept staring at him, waiting for a better explanation.

He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. Clearly he didn't want to be having this conversation any more than I did.

"Alright, you remember when this all started? The first time I flirted with you on a mission?"

"Yes." I snapped. What did this have to do with anything?

"And you remember how you noticed Natasha over my shoulder and asked if I was just flirting to make her jealous?"

"Yeah, and you said yes."

"Well, I lied."

I just stared at Clint, trying to process his words. He kept looking at me, but things still weren't quite clicking in my head.

He sighed and glanced down again. I'm sure he could read the confusion written all over my face and see the gears trying to turn in my head. He kept explaining.

"Natasha and I are best friends. Just best friends. I finally worked up the guts to flirt with you on that mission, and she was hovering to make sure I didn't chicken out. 'You're an Avenger, for God's sake. Toughen up'." He laughed at the memory of Natasha's words. "When you asked if I was just doing it to make her jealous... fuck, I can't believe I really did this, but I panicked. So I said yes, and then, well, there was never really a good time to take it back..."

I shook my head, barely able to believe what I was hearing. Clint was looking all around the room, pretty much anywhere but at me. When he finished speaking though, he refocused and met my eyes.

"I swear to you, it meant something to me. It always did."

I didn't know what to do, or what to say. It honestly seemed too good to be true, that the guy I'd been dreaming about for the past year at least was dreaming about me too, the whole time.

One look at Clint's face told me everything I needed to know. He was telling the truth, and he meant every word.

I smiled as it started to sink in. I couldn't help it. Clint cracked a small smile too, laughing nervously as he tried to read me.

"So does this mean we're good?" he asked, eyes flicking over every part of my face.

I nodded, my smile turning into a grin that stretch from ear to ear.

"We're good." Clint smiled too, and I noticed his eyes dart to my lips. I didn't waste a second before closing the gap between us, pulling him in for the kiss I wanted so badly at the masquerade, almost a month ago now.

We pulled apart briefly, both of us grinning like idiots.

"Damn, I wish we'd done this sooner," joked Clint.

"What, get into a big blowout, no-talking fight?" I joked back.

"No, this." Clint answered by pulling me into another kiss, this one lasting much, much longer. "I'm sure glad you waited until class was out to come track me down."

"Me too. Wouldn't want any college kids walking in and interrupting us." Clint grinned as I ran my hands through his hair, and suddenly I didn't mind being stuck at this college on a mission for the next week.

It was about damn time Clint and I got some time to ourselves.


End file.
